The First Thanksgiving

It was Captain Pierce of the Lion who strode the streets of London,
Who stalked the streets in the blear of morn and growled in his grisly
beard;
By Neptune! quoth this grim sea-dog, I fear that my master's undone!
'Tis a bitter thing if all for naught through the drench of the deep
I've steered!

He had come from out of the ultimate West through the spinning drift and
the smother,
Come for a guerdon of golden grain for a hungry land afar;
And he thought of many a wasting maid, and of many a sad-eyed mother,
And how their gaze would turn and turn for a sail at the harbor bar.

But famine lay on the English isle, and grain was a hoarded treasure,
So ruddy the coin must gleam to loose the lock of the store-house door;
And under his breath the Captain groaned because of his meagre measure,
And the grasping souls of those that held the keys to the precious
store.

But he flung a laugh and a fleer at doubt, and braving the roaring city
He faced them out--those moiling men whose greed had grown to a curse--
Till at last he found in the strenuous press a heart that was moved to
pity,
And he gave the Governor's bond and word for what he lacked in his
purse.

So the Lion put her prow to the West in the wild and windy weather,
Her sails all set, though her decks were wet with the driving scud and
the foam;
Never an hour would the Captain hold his staunch little craft in tether,
For the haunting thought of hungry eyes was the lure that called him
home.

Sooth, in the streets of Boston-town was the heavy sound of sorrow,
For an iron frost had bound the wold, and the sky hung bleak and dread;
Despair sat dark on the face of him who dared to think of the morrow,
When not a crust could the goodwife give if the children moaned for
bread.

But hark, from the wintry waterside a loud and lusty cheering,
That sweeps the sullen streets of the town as a wave the level strand!
A sail! a sail! upswelled the cry, speeding the vessel steering
Out of the vast of the misty sea in to the waiting land.

Turn the dimming page of the past that the dust of the years is dry on.
And see the tears in the eyes of Joy as the ship draws in to the shore,
And see the genial glow on the face of Captain Pierce of the Lion,
As the Governor grips his faithful hand and blesses him o'er and o'er!

Oh, the rapture of that release! Feasting instead of fasting!
Happiness in the heart of the home, and hope with its silver ray!
Oh, the songs of prayer and praise to the Lord God everlasting
That mounted morn and noon and eve on that first Thanksgiving Day!